Greg Abbott and My Marriage
Last August I told you about Greg Abbott filing briefs saying that the purpose of marriage is procreation and that why we can’t be having marriage equality.
Now I took this to be a slam against me personally because Ole Bubba and me ain’t in the procreation business any longer so I suspect our marriage would insult Greg Abbott’s world view.
Since August, the boy has doubled down on dumb.
He’s now arguing that the gay marriage ban reduces the number of out-of-wedlock births.
Okay, I’ll wait here while you get your brain put back together.
Attorney General Greg Abbott says Texas’ same-sex marriage ban should remain in place because legalizing it would do little or nothing to encourage heterosexual couples to get married and have children.
Abbott writes —
Texas’s marriage laws are rationally related to the State’s interest in reducing unplanned out-of-wedlock births. By channeling procreative heterosexual intercourse into marriage, Texas’s marriage laws reduce unplanned out-of-wedlock births and the costs that those births impose on society. Recognizing same-sex marriage does not advance this interest because same-sex unions do not result in pregnancy.”
So by not having gay marriage means that gay people will marry a member of the opposite gender and have babies because we are “channeling” them to do that.
Honey, if he lets go of that stretch, he’ll boomerang for about a week.
If one is going to make an argument that a statute meets the “rationally related to a legitimate government goal” test, shouldn’t one make a rational argument?
If the goal is to prevent out-of-wedlock childbirth, and same-sex unions do not result in pregnancy at all, there is no rational relationship between outlawing same-sex unions for the purpose of reducing out-of-wedlock childbirth.
I’d guess that he’s trying to say that if teh gays can get married, heterosexual couples will decide that marriage is somehow icky and have out-of-wedlock sexual relations instead. It’ll be interesting to see whether the court orders him to psych evaluation based on that argument.
1“Since August, the boy has doubled down on dumb.” That’s a classic understatement. Would 2×10^13 approximate the doubling down on dumb done by Abbott?
Given his hoof in mouth statements on both sides of the marriage equation, the Divorce Lawyers of America have a message for Greg: “please don’t help.”
2We’ve been all done with that procreation part for over forty years. Greg, like most republicans, always leaves me saying, “What? Huh?”
3Y’all shoulda been at Wendy’s carryings on last year when that fAmily with a bus full of kids showed up, all dressed nice and behaving in the Capitol. Y’all know that they have corporate sponsors, don’t you? What does Greg have to say about that?
4Personally I’m more in favor of the Nuns on a Bus and I’m not even Catholic.
Did he cheat his way through law school? I don’t think I’ve ever seen more convoluted, illogical thinking. Good grief.
5If Abbott wanted to reduce out-of-wedlock births and their burden on society, he’d promote good sex education and free or cheap birth control, and stop trying to eliminate safe abortion as a possibility.
Nope… that ain’t what he’s about. Or the GOP. They just want to point fingers at everybody not exactly like them, and make life as difficult for those folks as possible.
6When we married, my husband and I were both well past the procreation stage. Following Mr. A-butt’s “reasoning” to its logical conclusion (if any of his thoughts can be said to have logical conclusions), we shouldn’t have gotten married, since we could not produce offspring. He’s perfectly within his rights to think that, but he jumps off the cliff when he believes he has the right to turn that thought into a governmental edict.
7Besides, some folks just shouldn’t have babies for a variety of reasons.
8On a conspiracy level, all this wannabe gubment intervention in recreational sex and procreational sex is disturbing. The trajectory of the GOP in general is more control. For the Tea Bag Taliban it is control in a more personal sense. They aren’t a huge leap from decreeing people A and B should make babies because they both have qualities we appreciate and therefore support. OTOH people C and D come from undesirable backgrounds and so we should encourage them to reproduce only in numbers that keep their hard working populations stable. Something of a Nineteen Eighty-Four sense, as opposed to Atlas Shrugged.
9Of course this ridiculous argument is being made in front of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans. Those fools will buy anything Abbott spouts.
10I have to marvel at the logic. Then I have to go lie down for a while and recover.
So, “Recognizing same-sex marriage does not advance this interest because same-sex unions do not result in pregnancy.”
Obeying the law of gravity also does nothing to encourage heterosexual couples to get married and have children. But it’s still okay that it’s the law.
11Abbott is only parroting the argument that Indiana Solicitor General Thomas Fisher trotted out a couple months ago before noted Judge Richard Posner during oral arguments in the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2014/08/27/listen_to_judge_richard_posner_destroy_arguments_against_gay_marriage.html
Fisher didn’t get 30 seconds into his presentation before Posner cut him off, kicked his ass up around his ears and rolled him down the street. A pity that Fisher didn’t get run over by a CTA bus and put out of his misery.
More’s the pity … it wasn’t Abbott getting reamed out by Posner!
12Umpty, I was planning to reply about Posner’s shredding of this deeply stupid position. Here’s his full opinion, it is a thing of beauty:
https://www.scribd.com/doc/238677707/7th-Circuit-ruling-gay-marriage
My fave…”Heterosexuals get drunk and pregnant, producing unwanted children; their reward is to be allowed to marry. Homosexual couples do not produce unwanted children; their reward is to be denied the right to marry. Go figure.”
13Love that opinion. Of all the different Appelate Court decisions recently on gay marriage, I think that Posner’s opinion inspired the Supremes to take a hike last week when they refused without comment to hear the various states’ appeals. Posner put the whole debacle in such stark terms that even hearing arguments would only open the Supremes to ridicule. That stuffed shirt Scalia would have loathed the prospect because his inflated ego has been punctured publicly by Posner on several occasions previously.
14Chief characteristic of TX AG Ab-butt: totally and irredeemably weird-ass! My gawd, what with enterovirus hitting kids across the country and ebola in his own back yard, this is the best he can do? What a miserable wad of DNA!
15To minimize the number of out of wedlock births,the state of Texas should kill all boys and girls. There,I fick stit. 🙂
16Dinah-A-Butt is exactly the type of legal pretzel making the next whitey wingnut Potus would nominate for the Scotus.
17Okay, forget about gay marriage for a minute.
Does Greg Abbott think only married folks are having sex?
Well, that should be news to some.
18People who know me…. know I’m old. And, people who really know me.. know I read…… almost anything and everything. Except for the occasional baseball game…. my tv doesn’t get turned on. Because I’m old…. I belong to AARP. Because i read, and they send me a paper every month… I skip the ads, and read the paper. AARP does NOT endorse candidates. However, they do make people aware of issues.
These are some of the issues facing Texans in this election. First…. let’s talk “payday loans”. I live within a mile of where I grew up in Southeast Harris County. We are mostly low income, a lot of non-English speaking, and some “under educated” folks. So, the payday loan companies have set up shop out in my area of the County, one on every corner, and a couple in the middle of the block. Reason is simple: They are totally UNREGULATED by the State of Texas. A person can borrow $300 ….. if they give them as much a an old pair of sox. Now, with fees, and interest…. before they get out from under all this…. they will pay back over $700. No other state in the country allows this foolishness.
Another area “of interest to “older” voters” is the lack of inspection, and regulation of nursing homes. Texas’ regulations on nursing homes are so weak…. that the weakest, and most vulnerable among us… are not protected. Legal Adult Guardianship orders from other states are also ignored in Texas.
So, there are a whole lot of reasons, besides the obvious, to vote this year. Early voting starts in Texas on October 20th. See you at the polling place.
19I tried to read this last night, but it hurt my head. I thought I was just too tired. So,I’m back today.
Well, still no luck. And now my heiny hurts too knowing Greg Abbott could be our Gov.
Can we try to require intelligence tests for candidates of elected positions? And a psychiatric evaluation, please?
20“Texas’s marriage laws are rationally related to the State’s interest in reducing unplanned out-of-wedlock births. By channeling procreative heterosexual intercourse into marriage, Texas’s marriage laws reduce unplanned out-of-wedlock births and the costs that those births impose on society.”
First: what Rhea said!
Second: channeling all that into marriage results in WEAKER marriage. Has Greg Abbott never listend to “Paradise by the Dashboard Lights?” How about “Jackson?”
Finally, what about unplanned IN-wedlock births?
Here’s a great idea: allow marriages of any sort and promote adoption.
(signed)
21a Catholic Charities Alum
Abbott stepped in it deeply. Sounds like the Repugs are working up to pass a law which requires married couples to procreate. Now there’s small government for you.
22I didn’t realize Abbott was a Catholic and thought marriage was “for procreation.”
And it’s interesting that he wants to ensure a growing population for economic growth, but he doesn’t want to spend any taxpayer money on the baby boom he’s after–his pro-education ads are totally divorced from spending on education, and all about how miracles will bring “the best high schools in the country” to Texas, and babies will turn into “super-readers” without food, medical care, libraries, recreational opportunities, good preschools. Also, if all that’s needed for economic growth is a growing population, what’s his beef with immigration? Every one of those undocumented children who survived the trek north and across our borders could just as well become the the foundation for an economic boom as kids born to existing Texans.
23Texas’s marriage laws are rationally related to the State’s interest in reducing unplanned out-of-wedlock births…. Recognizing same-sex marriage does not advance this interest /I>
My goodness, this explains a lot!! There are an awful lot of other laws that don’t advance reducing unplanned out-of-wedlock births, either. That must be why Texas doesn’t regulate fertilizer and chemical plans, or have fire safety codes.
24Crap, sorry about the formatting mess.
25Friends,
26Sometimes, even from the considerable distance I live from Texas, the news I read here about your politicians scares me.
Forget Ebola, is the mindset that can create the virus known as Abbott contagious? If he is elected, a quarantine might well be in order. And, as bad as I would love to come down and get a haircut sometime . . . I just don’t know. You all take every precaution.
I think Mark Schlemmer here is on to something. Let’s quarantine Greg Abbott for a year & see how better off we are without him.
I volunteer to keep Greg in my ADA compliant tool shed & water him once a week.
27Lorraine in Spring, go easy on the watering or that blooming idiot will overrun your shed. No need to feed him, as he is self-fertilizing, excessively so.
28I would really like to say ‘boy you Texans really elected some really stupid people’. But I can’t!! Because there are SSOOOOooo many other states with the same level of idiocy in their public officials that I worry that there are so many that vote for them. It indicates the reasons that this country is falling down the slope to ruin.
29Expecting logic or rationality from Greggie is illogical and irrational. It’s time for Texans to get up off their lazy asses (present company excluded) and VOTE for a change.
30I just got back to my internet machine from a weekend with my 2 year old grandson. I understood what that little kid wanted every time he spoke, but I can’t damn figger out what the candidate is talking about. All I can discern is that Abbottoire should get out of politics.
31This is late to the discussion, but even a prominent writer of Abbott’s conservative stripe explains why his argument is so much crap.
“In sum,” writes Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post, “gay marriage opponents have lost the argument with the public and the courts because what was once a matter of defending social consensus has evolved into a plea for enforcement of one set of religious norms in a diverse society. Without evidence of harm to others, there is no constitutionally acceptable reason to preserve the distinction.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2014/10/13/why-gay-marriage-opponents-have-lost/?hpid=z
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